In the Land of the Elevator Girls uses the elevator as a metaphorical vehicle to reveal an outsider's gaze into contemporary Japanese culture. The continual opening and closing of elevator doors serves as a succinct formal device, as the viewer is offered brief glimpses of a series of landscapes — natural, urban, cultural and domestic. Doors open onto doors to reveal layers of public and private vision, transporting the viewer from theatrical performances and street scenes to an elevator surveillance camera's recording of everyday life.